Mindful eating (Its not a diet!)

We ate dal and stir-fried cabbage yesterday. My kids continued to eat while complaining that the dal today wasn't to their liking. When I tasted to check, I found that the salt is missing in action. I rectified the problem and the taste improved significantly. 

Why didn't they let me know that just a bit of salt was needed? 

They were watching TV during lunch, so couldn't be bothered to actually taste the food. 

It's the same story with adults. We just munch up a tub of popcorn while watching a movie, down 2-3 cups of masala tea/coffee while writing a report, or eat a cookie just because the jar was on the table! It's like the whole process has been automated. 

We can't even decide if we are hungry or not. We just look at the clock to help us decide, instead of listening to our tummy. 

We should know when we are hungry and when we are full, it should come naturally to us. 

But many of us struggle with that. 

There are essentially two types of hunger

• Physical hunger. This is actual hunger where the body gives you clues to restore nutrients. It builds over a period of time and signals include a growling stomach, lethargy, or irritability. It’s satisfied when you eat food.

• Emotional hunger. This is driven by emotional needs. Being bored, sad, or lonely can create food cravings, leading to the consumption of comfort foods. Eating in excess may cause guilt and self-hatred. Stress eating, binge eating disorders, and emotional eating are all responses not to hunger but to psycho-social issues.

I believe there is a third type also:

• Stimulation hunger. This is caused, by the excessive stimulation of the mind about food by images, smells, advertisements, books, and talks about delicious foods. (This releases ghrelin aka hunger hormone leading to snacking) 

For example; imagine someone talking about a new bakery just around the corner in your gym class, an advert of chicken wings, or the billboard of McDonald's when you are going out for lunch on a workday. You will be tempted to check it out and buy some.

Hunger is the stimulus and eating is the response. 

With actual hunger, eating is beneficial. Preferably if you are having a balanced diet.

Emotional hunger will lead to stress eating, binge eating disorders, and bad food choices in general. It will serve us well to look into the real cause of distress and seeking help.

Stimulation hunger will usually result in snacking and in excess calorie consumption.

 

How to find out if we are really hungry or not?

By being mindful.

Mindfulness is a meditation-like practice that involves paying attention to the present. A person who practices mindful eating approaches food without any bias. He /she truly enjoys the dish with all of their senses. It makes you more aware of the fullness cues and helps decide when to stop eating.

When you make eating an intentional process instead of the automatic one, you can eventually distinguish physical hunger from other stimuli and act accordingly.

Mindfulness-based approaches are effective in addressing binge eating, emotional eating, and eating in response to external cues. It helps in weight reduction simply because we pay attention to what we eat. It has been shown to help, to bring about long term behavior change and avoid rebounding weight.

Some basic techniques to be mindful

1. Make healthy eating easier- Buy healthy foods like whole foods and fresh, local vegetables. Prep them regularly and keep a desirable snack handy eg. washed apples and berries ready to eat. Keeping trail mixes in your lunch bag for sudden delays from the office. 

Remove all junk foods from your house or at least store them in hard-to-reach places, so that you don't grab them on the go. This makes healthy eating intuitive.

2. Eat when you are hungry- Don't skip meals. It'll make you so ravenously hungry that you want to wolf down anything in front of you quickly. This defeats the purpose of mindfulness where you need to slow down to notice your hunger cues and eat by following your appetite.

3. Take small portions- You can use smaller plates to create a full -enough plate. It creates a visual appeal while actually decreasing the amount of food we serve on it.

4. Engage your senses- Pay attention to the color, aroma, texture, sound, and mouthfeel of the food. It helps you to fully enjoy the bite that you take.

5. Remove distractions- Be present with the food on the table. Have a no-screen policy during meal times. When eating with family, have conversations between bites. It slows you down and gives the body enough time to transmit the fullness sensation to the brain.

6. Chew thoroughly- Chewing well helps in digestion and hence results in better absorption of nutrients. It also helps you slow down and appreciate the food more.

These techniques also have shown to increase self-care and self-compasssion and reduction in binge eating guilt trips.

Choose to be mindful, not mind-full.

Did you know that you can improve your health by sleeping??

I'll talk about it in my next post, so keep reading.

Till then, Be healthy, Be curious